Aunt Mall Cop
by Flapjaw
Summary: Molly meets some resistance when she tries to become more involved in her niece's life, and the state police aren't making her life any easier.
1. Enter Uncle Sam

An all-too-familiar and exceptionally irritating sound rang in Molly's ears, her groan soft and tired. She didn't like the alarm, but it was easier to slam her paw on the snooze button than to fiddle with a phone to turn off a more appealing digital alarm and that was of utmost importance to her. She was never a morning person until after her coffee, but she took her job seriously enough to crawl out of bed in a few minutes anyway. She stretched her naked body lazily, preferring to sleep in only her fur, her tail twitching up with mounting excitement. She always prepared her coffee in her programmable machine to start the brewing process at just the right time each morning, and all she had to do for the delicious brew was walk on padded feet to the small kitchen in her apartment.

After slipping on plain, tight, white panties and a navy blue skirt, Molly sat at her little table and drank from her "The Dice Love Me" mug, a newspaper opened before her. It was all nonsense and praise for the state police this week, as if the press was under their control somehow. Molly knew from experience that the civvies didn't want the state cops snooping around, and the fact that they blamed someone or many people from Possum Springs right away rather than contemplating the possibility of an accident soured relations even further. She sighed tiredly, leaning on the table and closing her eyes. With the chief gone she had to answer to the bitchiest, most self-righteous Lieutenant she'd ever met, and the men above him were almost as agitating themselves.

She opened her eyes with a glare, staring at her four pairs of boobs as if they'd personally affronted her. "You girls are causing me a lot of trouble lately." 'Molly' was an archaic term for a female cat, and 'Candy' evoked femininity and sensuality just as easily. Their parents had passed on the genes and names the sisters needed to marry a wealthy man and enjoy being eye-candy for the rest of their lives. Candy had tried something like that, but by the time Stan managed to stop drinking and kick his abusive habits the economy had struck down their lifestyle. Molly had wanted a similar life once, but she learned to be independent when one Tom took fooling around a lot farther than she'd wanted. She worked hard to become a cop, to prove she didn't need protecting and make a name for herself, but she still had a body men dreamed about and it was all the state cops coming in bothered to notice about her.

She needed a stronger drink, but she'd have to live through her shift first.

* * *

Molly gripped her steering wheel tighter as she came upon an unwelcome sight, her eyes glaring at Lieutenant Samuel Scriggins as he slowly started to step out of his cruiser, a self-satisfied smirk splitting his scaly face. Molly knew who he was about to find inside the Party Barn, and she also knew it was illegal for anyone to be trespassing inside the yet to be sold building. She couldn't let Mae be arrested for something so benign.

* * *

"Mae!" Bea caught the cat as she collapsed forward off the stage, lapsing into unconsciousness in the crocodile's arms. "Oh my God. What the eff just happened?"

"That doesn't matter right now," Angus asserted in spite of his shaking paws, turning toward the door. "Right now we need to get Mae to a hospital." The others were nodding in agreement as he pulled the front door open, but they all came to a halt when they saw an alligator in a state police uniform leaning on his cruiser, smirking down at them with sunglasses over his eyes.

"Uncle Sam?" Gregg questioned. It's what Steve called him whenever the subject came up.

"Hello, Greggory. You and your friends know you weren't supposed to be in there, right? That's private property, not a free venue for band practice." Gregg gulped and Bea tightened her hold on Mae defensively, then they all heard a car door slam and saw Molly storming toward them.

"God damn it," Bea muttered.

"What the Hell is going on here, Samuel?" As soon as neither cop was looking his way Gregg pulled a bag of shrooms from his jacket and quietly tossed them into the tall grass creeping up in front of the building. He wasn't so sure they wouldn't be found, but at least they wouldn't be found on his person.

"Trespassers, standard stuff. I know these kids, and I'm honestly surprised I've been here a whole week without seeing them break some sort of law."

"Were you too busy being smug to notice that they all look like they've seen a ghost, except my niece who Beatrice had to carry out of the building!?" Molly's indignation was stalled as Sam slowly removed his sunglasses, his expression calm and severe as he placed them in his pocket.

"These are my nephew's friends, but we can't show favoritism. Beatrice and Margaret can go with you to the hospital, so we can take care of your niece, but I need to have a little chat with the rest of them." Molly blinked, dumbfounded by what she'd just heard. She had expected to have a much tougher time getting Sam to be reasonable.

"I, uh… thank you, Sam. Come on, Bea, let's go!" Sam smiled as they ran off. It was everything other than comforting for Gregg, who had met Sam before and knew to keep his guard up. Sam's smile became gradually more smug the further away Molly ran, until she was driving to the hospital and he shifted his gaze back to Gregg.

"Well, time to get this sorted." He pulled his radio from his vest and depressed the transmit key. "Hey Johnson, Miss Molly is headed to Deep Hollow General with her unconsciousness niece and a goth croc. I need you over there to collect drug test results. I don't want family ties messin' this all up."

"I'm on it, Sammy," came the slightly distorted reply, the chirp of a bird in the voice.

"Between you boys and myself, though Johnson is a beaked fella he's taken a shine to Miss Molly. Damn strange if you ask me. It's one thing to appreciate outside your species, but he actually wants to date her." Germ was staring at Sam, expressionless, his emotions hidden deep. Gregg gulped nervously, keeping quiet, but Angus clenched his fists.

"And what the Hell does that matter?" Sam looked at Angus as if he'd grown a second head, tilting his own slightly.

"They can't make nothin' of it, that's what the Hell. That ain't no way for a family to form. The only thing worse than pinin' for someone of another species is goin' after the same sex." Angus barely suppressed a growl, starting to see how it might be possible that Sam knew Gregg but didn't know about their relationship. Gregg certainly wouldn't yap about it to a bigot. "Anyway, there's a reason I sent the ladies on their way. This next bit of business is a bit… ugly." In spite of his performed tone of remorse, Sam was smirking as he said it. "Now, I know in this town that I need to be prepared for this sort of thing, so I got my own little drug testing sticks ready in the cruiser."

"On what grounds are you testing us?" Some semblance of calm was gradually returning to Angus' voice, but it still shook with repressed rage. Sam just gave him another dumbfounded look.

"Are you thick in the head, son? A kitten is being driven to the hospital right now and I'm pretty sure I know why she wasn't fit to tell me why herself. If she was on somethin', we really need to know. She's a person of interest in this case, or so Doctor Hank told our Chief." With that said, the Lieutenant opened his cruiser to pull a compact box of syringes from his glove compartment.

"Come on, man." Gregg's voice shook with apprehension, the future he thought he had with Angus looking less certain by the minute. "Don't do this to me, Sam."

"Is that a confession, Greggory?"

 _Yes._ "Y-you know I hate needles, dude." Angus had wanted Gregg clean before the move, so he could apply for a new job without worry, but the stress of what Christine did to him every day he couldn't escape work on time tested his resolve and he had been found wanting. It only amounted to a few puffs of marijuana every other week, and he'd nearly finished selling off his shrooms to the local punks and crusties, but if Sam caught even a trace of the most benign of illegal drugs then Gregg knew he was doomed.

"There are a few facts we have to speak out into the open." Sam casually inspected a syringe as he spoke, but his expression was grim. "First, Greggory is on something illegal. Second, I'm going to get drug tests run for all of you. Third, a trespassing case involves informing the owner of the property. Fourth, I need someone Margaret trusts to keep an eye on her. And finally, those mushrooms you thought I didn't see are worth quite a nice pocketful of cash." Angus was starting to see why Gregg was afraid of this man.

"You like to hear yourself talk," Germ said suddenly. "It's annoying."

"What do you want from us?" Angus said it as quickly as he could, hoping Sam would ignore what Germ said, and aside from an agitated glance he actually did.

"Test results can be… fudged. Not Margaret's, but Gregg's. And I'm quite sure you were never in that building, just hanging out behind the monument like good citizens. I'll make the mushrooms disappear to everyone's benefit, and Jeremy here will keep an eye on Margaret for me. I want weekly updates on what she's up to, and if I don't get them then I'll become a lot less friendly."

"Why me?"

"Because the other two are gettin' outta this shithole, or didn't you know?"

"Right. That is a thing they decided to do." Germ ran the rest of the conversation through his mind again, keeping in mind that Steve seemed to be telling Sam just about everything except for the fact that Angus and Gregg were actually dating. "That is definitely a bro plan, between dudes, to go live together somewhere else, as dudebros."

Sam inhaled with a slight hiss, glancing at Gregg. "Does he always talk like that?"

"I mean, yeah dude." The tension in the conversation began to disperse, as an agreement had been reached that would at least keep them all out of jail, but Gregg's nervousness had seemed to spike at odd times and Sam had certainly picked up on it.

"It'll do you both good to get outta here. That's what I did. Being back stings a little. It's almost like there's some kinda poison in the air here." After pocketing the bag of mushrooms, Sam took a blood sample from each of them. Just before he ducked back into the driver seat of his cruiser, he turned back to Gregg with a piercing gaze. "I know you're hiding something, and I'm going to find out what it is."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Sam didn't seem to be listening to the evasive response, already driving off by the time Gregg finished speaking.

"Does he really expect me to tell him everything Mae does?"

"I think he expects you to do a bad enough job lying for him to figure out what's really happening on his own."

* * *

Mae was strapped into the back of Molly's cruiser as they sped toward the hospital, Molly turning down the radio so she could tune out the chatter while she spoke with Bea. "What happened?" Such a simple question with such and impossible answer. "Bea, please tell me what's going on."

"I… I can't." Bea still didn't understand what she'd seen in the Party Barn. It didn't make any sense. She wasn't making any sense. She was hardly keeping track of her own words.

"You can trust me. Please, I need to know." Molly was desperate, almost frantic, trying to mask it with some veneer of calmness.

"I can't. It's too… I don't understand what happened." Bea turned to Molly, studied her face, the tightening grip of her fingers on the steering wheel, and her uniform. She couldn't say what she'd really seen. She knew Molly would never believe it was real, but if it was real then any cult member she spoke to afterward would know. She was afraid that they all understood what was shaking the stability of her mind. "She just collapsed, for no reason at all."

Molly's grip tightened. "They are going to drug test her, Bea."

"Why do you think I'm so freaked out!? There weren't any drugs, she just fell over and passed out like… like she was exhausted or something." Bea saw Molly visibly relax, if only slightly. At least she seemed to believe her.

"I'm sorry. I'm worried about her, is all."

"Yeah." Bea looked back at her unstable friend, who was twitching and grimacing in her unconscious state, as if she was trapped in a terrible nightmare. "Me too."


	2. Time Sensitivity

Brian Johnson was an excitable bird. Had been since he was a kid. Even the slightest possibility of excitement or positive outcomes set him off on an eager chase, and that was certainly the case now. It was why he became a cop in the first place, and it was also why he eagerly jumped at the opportunity to spend more time with Molly. They'd been in the same highschool for exactly one year, he a freshman and her a senior. She'd definitely been the most attractive girl in the school, only rivaled by her sister, but it hadn't lead to anything; Brian had been keen to stay in his own league, and Molly Mauston seemed far above it. Then they both grew up, Candy married Stan of all cats, and Brian became a state police officer. Now their positions were reversed on paper: he'd been a cop for three years before she became one and he was personal friends with their current Lieutenant. Off the books everything seemed the same as always: Molly had been working these streets for most of her adult life and Brian knew next to nothing about the dying town. The important difference was that Brian was more confident. Molly was as gorgeous as ever, fast and efficient, and she knew how to handle a lot of strange folks whose requests made Brian question their sanity.

Still, he didn't want to come on too strong, especially not in the middle of such a crazy case. If he could impress her first then maybe he'd finally get that promotion and get the girl at the same time, but the latter required that he not make her uncomfortable like he always seemed to during every first date of his life. To pull off something like that he'd need the help of a particularly influential goat. "Yo Dan, I'm going to meet Molly at the hospital. She's probably shaken up over what happened to her niece, so if your patrol is getting boring I could use some backup."

"Sure. Fine. Whatever." Dan McConnell was one of only three local cops, including Molly Mauston, who hadn't gone missing during the incident. His familiar face alone would be a big help, even if he'd become extremely withdrawn and melancholy since the loss of so many of his fellow officers. At least, Brian assumed that's what was happening. He hadn't asked Molly if he'd always been that way or not. "I'll be there in thirty."

* * *

Molly looked over to Bea again, a set of keys in the crocodile's hand and a forlorn expression on her face. "What's wrong?"

"I just realized that Gregg and my truck are in the same place, but the keys aren't with them." Molly took a moment to process Bea's words, and then she chuckled.

"I'm sure he won't actually-"

"For the record, I'm not pressing charges."

* * *

"Eff me, Bea has the keys."

"Okay," Angus began, his voice calm and soothing. "Let's just think about this for a moment. We already paid the movers, and we have to leave with them in less than two hours."

"We aren't leaving without making sure Mae is okay!"

"I never said we were. Maybe we'll get lucky and someone we know will drive by. The hospital may be too far for us to walk there on time, but if we hitch a ride in the next twenty minutes-" Angus was cut off by the sound of something in Bea's truck breaking open. "Are you seriously hot-wiring Bea's truck?"

"She'll forgive me." One spark of cords later and the old vehicle hummed to life, Gregg's muzzle split by a wide grin. "Get in, nerds."

"Shit like this is why every emo chick in highschool has a crush on Gregg."

"Shut your beak and move your ass!"

* * *

It had almost seemed like they could enjoy normalcy for a moment. "Move! Move!" Then Mae's twitching had progressed to erratic convulsions. "Run in and tell them what's happening!" Bea ran toward the hospital while Molly dragged Mae out of the car, trying to hold her still to prevent her from falling in the parking lot. "Hold on, Mae!" She had always seen her niece and her friends as innocent, untarnished, and optimistic, but she had a creeping feeling that they were already a part of the things she'd been trying to protect them from. She felt Mae deliriously clawing at her vest, the worry making her legs tremble with every step.

Bea reached the automatic double doors of the county hospital, casting her gaze on the dozen or so people in the lobby, likely families waiting to see their loved ones after some surgery or some other operation. Even as she moved away from the windows at the front the light was stark and harsh, growing more and more chokingly artificial with every step. Her hands were shaking as she reached into the pocket of her dress, laying her clawed fingers on a half-empty cigarette box to calm her nerves. Before all the madness with the cult and Mae's breakdown near a hole where real people were sacrificed to a delusion Bea had been trying to quit. She hadn't even been smoking indoors for months, using a fake to give her something to chew on, but almost dying had set her back quite a bit. Now she wasn't even sure if the cult had been deluded in the first place, and she could barely breathe. "Somebody help us!" She skid to a halt in front of the reception desk, repressing her worries long enough to focus for Mae's sake, her panic only earning a bored expression from the receptionist. "My friend just collapsed, and we have no idea why."

"Get my niece a doctor right now!" The doe behind the desk was much more inclined to comply with the angry police officer carrying a convulsing young woman in her arms, typing a short number into the phone on her desk.

"'Fhalma?" Molly's ears twitched when Mae spoke, the sounds of her alien words seeming to sting all who heard them, but her voice was still desperate, as if she was calling out for help. "'Fhalma!? Gnaiih!?"

"Hush, Mae. Help is coming." Bea gulped. Mae was whimpering. Molly was stroking her head, even though her hand shook as she did.

Brian Johnson walked through the front doorway, nervously adjusting his cuffs as he strode forward. He'd hoped Dan would be with him when he arrived, but it hadn't quite been thirty minutes and the traffic had been light for Brian's drive. When Mae started screaming in pain and clutching Molly's shoulder he found his nerves diminishing, rushing forward with the instinct to help somehow. "What's wrong with her?" Bea shuffled away slightly gazing at him with uncertainty in her eyes, but Molly seemed mildly relieved by his presence.

"We don't know, but whatever it is seems to be getting worse."

"There are two cops here now. Do you understand?" The receptionist was clearly agitated with whomever she was speaking with, tapping her hoof-like fingernails on the desk impatiently. "That's her. She's making that noise." A pause. "Well obviously she's in pain. Just hurry up… please." She slammed the phone down and sighed, closing her eyes and massaging her temples. Molly managed to calm down Mae's unexpected fit, but her face showed she was still struggling with some internal pain. It could have been drug-induced damage to her organs or an entirely mental affliction of torturous nightmares in her unconscious state, or some combination of those, perhaps even something entirely different that Molly didn't have the medical knowledge to understand. Not knowing made the wait for the doctors nigh unbearable. She let Brian gently guide them to a few chairs so they weren't just standing in front of the desk, lost in her worries.

Eventually the doctors arrived, moving with haste. When Molly placed Mae on the stretcher her grimace intensified, her hands reaching out toward Molly even though her eyes remained shut. Brian argued with the doctors in her defense, insisting also that drug-testing was a top priority and that they really didn't have time to talk Molly out of going with them. "She's a professional. She won't get in your way." With Molly nearby Mae was much more docile, though she kept muttering nonsense words and released the occasional pained sob.

When they were gone Brian slumped into one of the lobby chairs with a tired sigh, running his fingers through the plumage on his head after tossing his cap onto the table in front of him. Bea slowly took a seat to his left, fiddling with her fake cigarette in her pocket, not willing to even pretend in a hospital, in spite of how desperately she wanted to. "I'm sorry we had to meet under such unpleasant circumstances, young miss." Bea stared at him, as if searching for something in his eyes. It was a little unnerving, but he just stared back, not sure what else to do.

"Hmmm..." Perhaps she'd found what she was looking for, her expression softening as she leaned back into her chair. "She's tough. She'll be alright."

"Molly has mentioned Mae a few times, but we're usually working when we talk so I don't know much." He felt awkward and out of place, grasping for the right words. "The name's Brian, by the way."

"Bea." She made the decision to trust Brian, mostly. He was from out of town so she doubted he had direct contact with the cult before and she really needed someone to talk to. She'd just have to be careful on the off chance that one of the local officers he worked with happened to be a cult member. "I run the – I mean, work at the local hardware store. I might as well run it. I do all the work, the scheduling, handle calls and the budget. I assign workers and run interviews… do inventory. That sort of stuff."

"So, the 'everything' sort of stuff." Brian couldn't help being impressed, in spite of their uncertain situation. "Who owns the place, then?"

"My dad owns the 'Ol Pickaxe, but you don't have to pretend that you care. I don't know why I'm talking your ear off about it now. I guess I'm so worried about Mae that I'm just talking to keep myself distracted."

"I'm worried, too. Molly is a friend of mine so I'm a little shaken myself." Brian took a moment to sort his thoughts, trying to smile as he switched back to what he thought was a happier topic. "So is your father testing you with all this extra work? Maybe to hand over the business?"

Bea laughed mirthlessly, shaking her head at herself. Here she was telling a complete stranger about her problems just to keep her thoughts away from drum-playing spirits and human sacrifices. "Haha… no. No he's not." Brian was still smiling softly at her, but something had changed in his eyes. Bea was reminded of the looks some men had given her mother while she was alive, and the look Mae had given her the night they'd fought over this very subject. There was something protective and indignant in such a gaze, as if he was angry on her behalf. She wasn't sure how she should feel about it, but it was strangely comforting to see that expression on an older man. It made her feel closer to her mother, but also reminded her of how distant she and her father were lately. She also felt strange and mildly disgusted with herself for feeling that way, but she didn't know why.

"I see." Before Bea could decide exactly how to feel about the moment they'd shared another officer made his way toward them, only she recognized this one. Dan fell into a chair with all the grace of a potato sack, smelling faintly of booze. "You alright there, buddy?"

"Sure ain't, Brian, but I'm here anyway." While they were trying to think of something to say the hospital doors opened again, Gregg, Angus, and Germ rushing into the building and heading straight for Bea. Gregg nervously glanced at the two officers. Angus checked his watch. Germ took a seat.

"Hey, guys."

"Hello, Jeremy."

"Where's Mae?" Bea shrugged her shoulders at Gregg, mentally drained.

"The doctors are taking care of her now. Molly is with them so I don't think they'll appreciate any more bodies in their way."

"But we have to see her! We only have two hours-"

"An hour and a half," Angus impulsively corrected.

"…An hour and a half before we have to leave town!"

Dan leaned forward in his seat, giving Gregg a patient expression. "The most important thing is that she gets better, and interrupting them just to get a look at her isn't gonna help with that."

"But..." Anything Gregg could think to say felt hollow and pointless. He couldn't change the facts. He'd been ready to leave his friend behind when she was healthy and he expected her to have a decent job, but not like this. Now that ghosts and eldritch monsters seemed to be real things his priorities were changing.

Angus gently guided him to a seat, standing beside him as there weren't any nearby chairs left. "We can stay for an hour, but if she can't accept visitors by then..."

"Yeah, I know."

"I'm sure she'll be fine." Bea didn't really believe it, but she did her best to fake optimism. "Besides, you can still ask her all about what happened on chattrBox later."

"You're pretty calm, huh?" The accusation in his voice asked, _don't you care at all?_ It made her blood boil and her hands clench into fists.

"I'll see her again soon. That's good enough for me." _You'_ _re_ _the one who's leaving,_ she replied with the contempt in her tone. _Not me._ That did a good job of shutting Gregg up, but it also left a stinging sensation in Bea's throat. Beneath the layer of admonishment was poisonous jealousy. All she had ever wanted to do was leave Possum Springs behind, and he would long before she ever could.

"So..." Brian's voice gave away his lack of understanding of what had been said beneath the words, and Bea gladly turned to him for a distraction. "What _did_ happen, exactly?" She regretted giving him her attention, once more trying to lie and half-truth her way around mentioning the unspeakable and chilling event she'd recently witnessed. They couldn't be told; none of them could laugh about it later to those who already knew: ghosts are real.

* * *

"What did you do to her?" Mae's struggling had stopped, fresh blood on her claws from her desperate grasping at Molly's arm. "What did you do!?"

"She's been sedated. She was obviously in pain-"

"You what!?" Molly struggled to contain her rage, stepping a little too far into the doctor's personal space for his comfort. "She was already unconscious! You don't sedate people in comas, do you?"

"She was mauling you, in case you didn't notice." The doctor was incensed and indignant, but Molly didn't care. She stood there fuming in rage while the doctor angrily explained away his actions. "A bit of valium won't hurt her, and when the test results come in then we'll know how to help her. Now, if you would please get out of the way so we can work, I'd be _most_ appreciative."

"Okay." Her voice was icy with the sting of failure and the apprehension of uncertainty. "But if she doesn't wake up, I'm suing you." She gave Mae a parting glance, watching her face twitch and wondering once again what could possibly be happening behind those closed eyes, and then she turned to leave. "Let me know the _second_ she can accept visitors."

"Sure." _Just get out already._


	3. Deaf Ears

"Hey, Mae." Two visitors at a time, that was their limit. Gregg and Angus had just enough time to see her for a few minutes. "This is about the time I should be making one of our stupid jokes, like: too bad you didn't collapse from exhaustion on stage. Except, this time, you did." Angus' hand on his shoulder was the only anchor keeping Gregg steady, but it was all he needed to say what was on his mind. "I know you probably can't hear me right now, but I love you." He felt Angus' grip tighten slightly. "You're like a sister to me. If there was someone I could blame for hurting you like this, I'd break all their teeth."

"Me too." Angus' voice had the same grave but calm tone Gregg had heard after the collapse of the mine, the tone of someone who would kill for the right reasons. It was strange to think that way, to not feel guilt for playing a part in the deaths of others. Gregg was still adjusting to the idea of having real, tangible enemies, rather than just people he didn't like very much; they had fought against the cult with everything they had.

"We've done way too much cool stuff together for you to go out like this; Nightmare Eyes should go down swinging, don't ya think?" Of course, there was no response. He squeezed her hand, trying to hold on. "I had never met a girl like you before. You were almost like one of the guys, most of the time. When I saw you trying to be different so Cole would like you… it hurt. I never wanted to see you treat yourself like that, as if you weren't good enough just being yourself. After that whole thing fell apart," Gregg shuddered, remembering the part he had played in separating them; he'd always thought she'd be better off with Casey, or anyone else, but he also felt responsible for how sad and angry she was immediately afterward. "Well, I'll never forget what you said to me. 'It doesn't matter that Cole was cute; it matters that Cole was Cole.' That's when you decided that it didn't matter if someone was a guy or a girl; the only thing that mattered to you from then on was _who they were_. Ehehe…" Gregg's giggling almost devolved into sobs until Angus put his arm around him, hugging him close. He sniffled, and then mustered the strength to continue. "I don't know why it took me this long to figure it out, but I think that maybe you were right. I'm not with Angus because he's a cute guy. I'm with Angus because he's the right person." He couldn't avoid thinking back to when they were younger and he was more reserved. When she didn't know he was gay; when she tried to tell him she loved him. "Why does someone as amazing as you have to be alone? It's not fair."

Angus held Gregg close, letting him release his sadness in the form of sobs and tears. There was nothing he could say that would help. There were so many things he wanted to tell Mae too. He wanted to say how sorry he was for blaming her for Gregg's mistakes, but he couldn't find a way to say it that wouldn't hurt Gregg. He was already feeling guilty for so many things and Angus couldn't bring himself to make it worse. He wanted to tell her how brave she was for telling George and Lily the truth about their son, but Gregg still didn't know that they'd done that and it definitely wouldn't be the best way for him to find out. Instead he just stood there, holding Gregg until his emotions were back under his control. "She'll be alright, Gregg. Afterall, she's got a lot of other people waiting to see her."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." They made their way back to where the others were still gathered in the lobby, passing the three cops on their way to Germ and Bea. Molly, Brian, and Dan seemed engrossed in their discussion, speaking in hushed tones and pacing with severe expressions on their faces. "Your turn, nerds." As Gregg said it Angus checked his watch again. After a tired sigh they both started for the exit.

"Okay, lets go then."

"Actually, Germ…"

"Yeah?"

"I…" Bea almost said she wanted to be alone with Mae, because that way it would be easier for her to say what she wanted to, but as she looked into Germ's eyes she saw the concern for his friend that he hid behind his constant calm facade and she just couldn't delay him any longer. Besides, Germ had a way of making everything easier just by being in the same room. "Nevermind, it's nothing. Lets go."

* * *

"Sam wants to check out the old mine in the woods past the Food Donkey." Dan scoffed at Brian, turning away and shaking his head. "Look man, we've been up the asses of everyone who lives in this town for a whole week and still have nothing. The Commissioner is getting desperate. He's giving us free reign to pursue any possible leads our Lieutenants are sniffing out. He figures that with enough small teams looking in different directions that one of us will actually find something."

"You really think anything 's changed over there in a couple months?" Dan seemed agitated by the proposition, shaking out his hoofed fingers for the umpteenth time as if he was developing a permanent tick.

"Dan, I understand what you're going through, but you really shouldn't have been drinking on the job." Molly still seemed to be able to calm him down; the fact that she had to do it by pointing out his compromised state of mind made no difference to Brian as long as he finally started listening to reason. "If we're going to be given more autonomy as a unit then I should probably have a chat with Sam… and apologize."

"Apologize? For what?"

Molly shook her head. "It's stupid. I guess he rubbed me the wrong way when he first got here, and he still seems full of himself, but he's not entirely unreasonable. To tell you the truth I think I just didn't like that he told me what to do and when to do it. It's his job to, but our Chief had such a laid-back attitude most of the time. He didn't really take any of the disappearances around here seriously, so leading investigations was actually my job in practice. The more I think about it, the happier I am to have Sam's help, and yours."

"I, uh…" Brian released a nervous laugh, scratching the back of his head. "Th-thanks, Molly!"

"Don't mention it. It'll ruin my reputation." Molly had a decision to make. She could tell Brian that she wasn't interested in him to get his head straight and keep him focused on the case, but that ran the risk of hampering his effectiveness and hurting their relationship, since it would impolite to say something like that before he made a clear advance; she could leverage his attraction to her to her advantage to take some measure of indirect control over the case; or she could ignore the issue entirely until he was brave enough to ask her out so she could let him down easily. In the past she had always taken the third option, and she would this time, but the situation was growing serious enough that she had actually considered doing… something else. She was mildly disgusted with herself just for thinking it. "I'm going to call my sister, let her know what happened. I was so worried about getting Mae here in time that it just slipped my mind until now."

* * *

Bea glanced back at Germ when they reached the threshold of Mae's room, numbered 73, giving herself one more moment to collect herself and prepare for what she'd see inside. Shortly she was within, wondering what she'd been worried about in the first place. Mae was just laying there, peacefully unconscious, and seemingly unaffected by the convulsions that had plagued her during their drive to the hospital. The only indications that anything was wrong were their environment and the dried blood at the tips of Mae's fingers where her claws had retracted. While Bea had been staring and studying, Germ had dragged two chairs close to Mae's bed. The two then sat together, just watching Mae's gentle breathing and pulling their thoughts together. After a few minutes, Germ spoke. "Guess there's not much to do here. We could talk to her, but she's probably not going to say anything back right now."

Bea shook her head, a small smile forming. "What she says or doesn't say really isn't the point, Germ."

"What is the point?"

"That she knows we're here." Bea pulled her fake cigarette from her pocket, idly twirling it between her fingers. "The point is that she hears us, the voices of people she cares about, and who care about her. Should help her wake up faster."

"She's only been out for an hour or so. We probably shouldn't be too worried."

"Ha!" Bea's smile grew mirthlessly. "After what we saw? I'm going to be worried for the rest of my life."

Germ huffed, looking down at his knees. "That's not a great way to live. That's not even an okay way to live."

Bea looked over at him, her eyes narrowing as she studied his face. He caught her looking, but couldn't maintain eye-contact for long. He looked away and started to fidget with his jacket sleeves. "I can see it in you now. It wasn't there before. The constant pressure of daily life. The worry and the anxiety of too much responsibility for one person." _And the weight of loss_ , was what she thought next, but couldn't bare to say. His fidgeting worsened, and Bea's face settled into a grimace. "What changed, Germ."

"Uncle Sam."

"What about Sam?"

"I don't want to talk about it." Germ needed just a little space and short moment of time, and Bea could tell, so she waited. He fidgeted a bit longer and then looked up to Bea sadly. "He's got us, Bea."

"What do you mean?"

"Blackmail." Bea was no longer sure she wanted to know, but Germ continued his explanation. "We'll all get in a lot of trouble for being in the Party Barn if I don't do what he wants, and Gregg could be locked up for a long time. He's making me spy on Mae."

"What!? Why!?"

"Keep your voice down." She nodded, mouthing a silent apology. "He thinks she has something to do with all those disappearances." He saw the look on her face and sighed. "Why _did_ she have something to do with those disappearances?"

"Because the only people who disappeared were part of that murder-cult you seemed so chill about."

Germ gulped. "You mean the police Chief was one of the people who chased you in the woods?"

 _And a couple of other people._ She dreaded where their conversation was heading, but she couldn't do anything to stop it. It was too late. "They did a lot worse than that. Why do you think we asked you to blow up a well?"

"I don't like asking questions. I just like helping. She had a long fall, but she picked herself back up, and I wanted to help."

"It's okay, Germ. You did help, even if-"

"You read the God damn list." Bea gulped. Germ was gripping his chair with anger that Bea had never seen from him before. "I'm tired of waiting for you to own up to it. You got me to help you kill my uncles."

"Germ-"

"Say it." Bea could hear his fingers digging into the chair. "Say it!"

"I know there were two Wartons on the list!" Mae's face contorted in her unholy slumber, and the short silence seemed to last for an infinity. "You didn't know jack shit about the cult. I was hoping you could live your life mourning your uncles like I mourn my mom. I don't know how to imagine it but this has to be worse."

"Did you really think I was that stupid? They've been gone since that night."

"I didn't want you to live knowing that your uncles helped murder a bunch of teenagers." There was silence for a time yet again, but this pause was calmer, Mae's expression softening again while her friends tried to decide what to think of each other. It didn't take long for Germ to stand and walk toward the door. "Wait." He slowed.

"How did it happen?"

"One of them, Eide was his codename," it just came spilling out, "he attacked Mae at the elevator shaft while we were trying to leave. When we lowered the elevator to send him back down he lost an arm and... the whole thing collapsed."

"It was an accident."

"Yes."

Germ clenched his fists, his shoulders shaking. "So the only person who had an active role in killing them was me." He wanted to hate them all; to pull the door open and storm off in a rage, but something else Bea had said kept him there. He slowly turned around, searching her eyes. "A bunch of teenagers, you said." Bea gulped. "Who?" She shook her head, looking panicked, but he had to know. "Who?" His voice had lost its anger, his tone patient and measured. "Who?"

"Casey Hartley." Germ had known Casey. They had been friends. "And... others."

"How many?"

"Thirty-nine." Germ wanted to vomit, tears stinging his eyes as his hand grasped for the door-handle. He imagined either of his uncles attacking Mae, his mind churning with all the ways that a person could be killed. He didn't want to know for certain how they'd done it, but not knowing may have been worse. He couldn't decide what was worse: the knowledge of what they'd done, or the fact that knowing it made him feel like he'd done the right thing when he'd sealed them in the Earth. "Germ?"

"I- I have to go." He was crying by the time he stumbled past the door, and Bea was left alone with Mae in the sterile room. Somehow it felt smaller with him gone.

"What are we going to do, Mae?" Of course, there was no response. "Everything seemed so terrible before. My life was garbage, and I was going nowhere, but now?" She laughed, even though nothing was funny. "Now everything is so much worse, and none of the shit I was going through before has gotten any better. It's funny, but I almost expected my dad to be one of the cult members. Turns out that one of the guys who works for us was in it instead, and it wasn't the creep, either. Paul Cantor, one of the nicest, most polite men I've met in my life. I think about when they were talking to us, and I wonder if I just didn't recognize his voice, or if he didn't talk to us for fear I might. It's ironic that the only way we could get a perfect list of all of them was to let them die in their own hole. If we'd known sooner we might have been able to collect some evidence and, I don't know, do something with the cops I guess. Then maybe Germ wouldn't be part of the young-but-dead family members club." Bea glanced at the door, fighting to suppress tears of her own. It seemed she'd have some time alone with Mae afterall, but the reason why weighed heavily on her conscience. "Why didn't we talk to him, Mae? He didn't go into the mine, but he was with us while we were just hoping not to be killed, and he was right there when we climbed out into his backyard. I want to pretend that I took his silence as a signal to pretend it never happened, but I honestly just never stopped to think about it. There was always something that seemed immediately more important on my mind." Bea's eyeliner ran down her cheeks with her tears. The sheer deluge of her sadness blurred her vision and her quiet sobbing echoed off the walls. "Is this how you felt when you just f-f-forgot my mother was dead?" She buried her face in her hands, not able to bare seeing herself. "I can- I can't be mad at you anymore! I-I did the same thing."

Trapped in her own mind, Mae gave no response.


	4. Stray

"I still can't believe it took the commissioner two days to approve this search." Brian wasn't usually one to complain, but apparently he found the delay weird enough to comment on it, and to do so often. "What does he expect us to find on the town's streets? Jaywalking?"

"More like drug-deals, probably." Dan's tone was tired and disinterested, as if he really couldn't care less about his job anymore. "Nothing to do with the case, though."

"I'm more annoyed that we could only get one cruiser for this trip." Sam was more agitated than Molly had ever seen him, practically growling his words out between his sharp teeth and gripping the steering wheel roughly enough to leave scratch-marks. "Officers aren't supposed to be sitting in the back, unless they betray the law." Molly quirked a brow in his direction, incredulous even as she knew nothing of Sam's casual hypocrisy.

"You expect to find someone in need of being arrested out here?"

"Not really, but I hope so." He smirked. "It would sure make me feel better." Molly just shook her head at him and the other two officers chuckled quietly, Sam's grip on the wheel easing slightly. "How's Margaret doin', by the way? I expected her to be causin' some trouble out on the streets again by now." Molly sighed heavily, thinking back on how Candy and Stan had taken the news about their daughter being in the hospital yet again. They were worrying themselves to death and Molly wasn't fairing much better herself.

"All the tests they ran came back negative, but she's still asleep. It's almost like she's in a coma with no clear cause, except that she sometimes mutters gibberish in her sleep. It doesn't make any sense at all."

"Normally I'd say you should let the doctors worry about that mystery and focus on this one," Sam said simply, though a grimace of sympathy was slowly forming on his face. "But in this case-"

"No, what you'd normally say is right. If I let my personal attachments get in the way I won't be much use out here, and I really want to catch the fuckers who did this." Sam was as surprised that Molly was listening to him as she was that he was giving good advice, doing a double-take as he glanced at her briefly before returning his attention to the snow-covered dirt road. Whatever had happened to Mae seemed to have sobered them all, and the four of them had been working together much more smoothly since that event. Molly couldn't shake the feeling that what happened was related to the big case somehow, even though the thought was both baseless and ridiculous on the face of it. How could the disappearance of one group of people have anything to do with someone else suddenly going comatose over a week later? No rationale she applied could banish the absurd thought from her brain, however, so she was just trying to ignore it and do her job.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Sam placed a hand on her shoulder, giving her a look that spoke of understanding, his eyes deep with calculation and his lips forming a worried frown. "If you need a few days off to regroup, I'll make sure you can have 'em." She released a shuddering breath she hadn't noticed she'd been holding.

"Thank you, Sam."

"Well, on a more pleasant note, we're plenty far in to get the fuck out of this cramped car now." Since Molly was nodding along with Dan's words as some upturned _old_ mine-carts came into view Sam decided to defer to their judgment on the matter. This was their town, afterall. Soon the cruiser was parked and they all piled out, ready to begin.

"Welp, the entrance to the mine is caved in." Molly's observation was said in a manner that conveyed that she had no idea what to make of this information, but they were all happy to have found something right away. The snow easily hid the story the ground may have told from their sight.

"Alright, that's a great start right there. Spread out slow and steady, torches to the ground." He clicked on a flashlight even though they were awash with daylight, banishing even the shadows of the trees wherever his gaze fell, and the others followed suit. "We don't wanna destroy anything that the snow hasn't mucked up yet. Record anything weird and start doubling back in a couple hours so we can compare notes and figure out what in the Sam Hell happened here. Once we have the lay of the place we'll search around the mine entrance together."

* * *

The search began in earnest as they all separated to cover as much ground as possible, Brian's feathered fingers in particular itching toward his pistol out of a steadily developing nervous habit the further they all moved from one another. There didn't seem to be much to fear from such a routine search, but there didn't seem to be much reason for their mission to be approved so slowly by the commissioner. There definitely wasn't any sensible reason for someone to just pass out and stay out for as long as Mae had. It seemed pretty odd that the snowfall had suddenly become almost like a blizzard the night before their search was to start, as if specifically summoned to impede their work.

"Don't think that way, Brian." He chided himself quietly. Despite his fascination with mysticism and the occult as a child and the weird atmosphere of Possum Springs, Brian was an adult, an atheist, and a police officer. He didn't have time to be worried about ghosts and summoned storms when there were real problems for him to deal with.

On that thought his mind wandered to Bea, as she'd introduced herself, and he wondered just how old she was, or rather how young. The amount of responsibility that was being shoved on her really didn't sit right with Brian, especially when he considered what a useless mess of a man he'd been at her age. He tried to come up with a good excuse to have a chat with her father sometime without distressing the poor girl further. He needed more information to come up with a good strategy, and that meant talking to the problematic elements directly. He needed to know how they thought, what their motives were, and what they were doing to wreck the resolve of the strong young woman running their store. Certainly she'd only really talked about her father, and that was the best place to start, but Brian didn't suspect that any older men or women whom Bea was meant to instruct would show her much respect.

As a gust of wind rolled through the trees above and the hoot of an owl sounded Brian had to ponder why he couldn't get his mind off of Bea and her struggles, even though he had plenty of problems of his own and a case to solve. It was exactly like when he'd obsessed over some way to help Candy and Molly get those dipshits who had been held back a grade to leave them alone and maybe get their attention at the same time.

"Nonono..." He muttered to himself, shaking his head as if disgusted by his own thoughts. "Just help Bea, like a friendly, not-creepy-at-all person, and then confess to Molly so she can reject you like you've been preparing for your entire life." Brian scowled, sweeping his flashlight over the indifferent snow erratically. "But first, solve the damn case." He had been wandering around uselessly for over an hour, not sure what he was even looking for, and finding nothing of even mild interest. The owl gave another hoot. "Solve the case!" Hoot. "Find literally anything related to your job, you pathetic piece of garbage." Hoot-hoot. "Oh shut up!" As the owl flew away in distress, Brian's left eyelid began to twitch. "I think I'm going insane." The wind breezed through the branches, and they groaned quietly as if in somber agreement.

* * *

Molly's ear was twitching, and it wouldn't stop.

She wanted to find tracks, or a sign of a struggle, her boots carefully pushing aside patches of snow to give her a better view of the ground, but in spite of her best efforts to remain calm, careful, and slow, she couldn't shake the sound in her ear. It was so faint that she was sure she was imagining it, and besides that it almost just sounded like a dull ringing, like she heard as if from her own skull after moments of euphoric pleasure, and just like in those moments it mostly registered as a feeling rather than a sound. It was wrong, though. It felt like that pleasant buzz was reversed, clawing and agitating, and heralding the arrival of something rather than the end of a moment of bodily bliss.

Molly shook her head viciously, refusing to acknowledge such ludicrous phantasms. Her nerves were just getting the better of her.

Yet, the not-sound was getting stronger. Molly navigated toward the source as if by primal instinct, her posture lowering to a pent-up crouch, as if she was ready to pounce. As she got closer to the source an actual sound blocked out the odd sensation, but the wet squelching just made her more uneasy. _You know how many times I've shot someone?_ In haughty defiance of the feeling of dread creeping through her, Molly's fingers didn't tremble in the slightest as she quietly slipped her gun free of its holster. _Once_. Many more shots had been fired in ranges at inanimate targets, and Molly flipped off the safety with confidence, creeping up to the tree that hid the source of that horrible noise. _You should carry a battleaxe_. There was no logical reason to believe she would find anything other than one animal eating another as she heard wet flesh ripping with an odd pattern and somehow cavernous cadence, but the many illogical reasons were enough for her this time.

Black, disgusting chitin, both solid and shifting with twisted, tortured shapes. Eyes that bled a constant stream of green ichor, the substance bending to form shapes that she couldn't define off-hand before funneling back into the eyes that bled the streams, a constant supply of physics-defying gore. Quadruped, but more limbs sprouted from its back, clutching a bone. Three separate maws with smiling rows of teeth that were as white as maggot flesh. Flickering embers sputtered from gaping holes on its back, and the thing turned toward her.

Molly screamed, most of her body frozen in terror and confusion, but her finger pulled the trigger.

Suddenly it had vanished from sight, or even having been seen, and the memory of it was a hazy mess that fought with the totally contradictory sight of having turned to see absolutely nothing chewing on the corpses, but the corpses and the chewing itself remained in her mind, even the floating bone that once seemed to be held by the beast. The corpses were still there, even though the bone was no longer suspended in the air, and Molly fought the urge to vomit.

There might have been four of them, and she could make out both feathers and fur, but there was nothing else identifiable about the mess of melted people in front of her. The mass had frozen in place after they'd been melted, if that was even the right way to describe what she was seeing, and the remains formed a perfect square in the snow, bones shaped into symbols on the surface, with a twisting spire of frozen blood reaching up from the center, as high as the top of Molly's chest. The smell on the air was like a toxic fire's hazardous fumes, but the smell of death was conspicuously absent, and Molly squinted at the mass in front of her, sure that it had been a more definable group of individual dead just seconds ago, but the memory wouldn't form.

She did remember what chewed at them, even as her mind screamed that it wasn't real. A scuttling noise in the snow settled the matter for her nicely, Molly scanning the area around her to no effect. She still couldn't see it.

"Molly, was that you screaming?" Brian's voice came from her hand radio, worry clear in his tone. "We're on our way, just hold on."

"Molly, if you can answer I want a situation report!" Sam's voice was demanding and self-assured, interspersed with huffs of breath as he sprinted back toward where they started to follow her path out. "Why did you open fire? Who are we fighting?"

When her off-hand pulled her radio up to her mouth and depressed the transmit button her fingers _did_ tremble. "I-I have a contact." Her voice sounded meek and terrified, and she couldn't have that. Not now. She swallowed hard, trying bury her dread in calm resolve, ready to speak with confidence.

Except, she had no idea how to describe what she had seen. "What contact?" It was Sam's voice again. "Details, lass! Details!" She heard movement in the snow to her right. _Did you kill 'em?_ She didn't finish pulling the trigger, Dan holding his hands up calmly, his own radio in his hand.

When Molly lowered her weapon he spoke into his radio. "It was just a wolf. A really big one, but I think Molly scared it off already." There were several things wrong with what he'd just said, the least of which being that there were no tracks in the snow. With Dan behind her Molly crept forward to where she first saw the monstrosity, and the mess of melded together bodies was nowhere to be seen, but the strangely benign imprint they left in the snow remained. She was already trying to find ways to make the others believe her, considering how unhelpfully vague her only piece of evidence was, but such thoughts were formed mostly to distract herself from what she'd seen, heard, and _felt_ in the last few moments. At first she had expected some admonishment from her peers after Dan's assessment of the situation, but none was forthcoming. They had heard the pure terror in her voice, the truth in it keeping mocking far from their minds. Regardless of what had really been seen, there was no denying it had been traumatizing.

"We're still on our way. We'll all head back to the mine entrance together." None of them knew for certain how close they were to the jaws of death, but at least Molly was finally displaying a fraction of the appropriate level of fear for them being so near The Hole.


End file.
